Sarah Appleton - Textile Artist Blog

During September I worked on a project with my Mum in which we collaborated on a single square to be sent off as part of a bigger project called ' The Nationwide Skirt of Welcome '. The giant skirt is being made from many patchwork squares to welcome Little Amal (who is anything but little) to the UK and raise awareness for refugees - especially displaced children. If you want to know more, or to donate, please use the above links - at the very least you should check out the amazing puppeteering; I can tell you from first hand knowledge that working with these giants is not easy! It was my Mum's idea to take part in the project but given my history with giant puppets  I was happy to help! The theme of the skirt is British Flowers, so we decided to make a bluebell and dandelion applique and embroidered piece. I sketched out the design and we both worked on the actual making of the square. Here it is in its finished glory: It ended up being a good representation of both of o...

I've had a busy couple of weekends recently. Last Saturday, the 18th of September was my cat James'  16th birthday - which makes him about 80 years old in human years! I've had him ALL of that time, so it was a really special event and I wanted to commemorate it by making him something fancy. I'd had the crochet pattern for a small cat blanket for quite some years; regular readers will know about my dabblings in crochet ... I am by no means an expert but I love giving it a try with varying results! So here's the latest effort: It's also high time that we had some decent pictures of the boy himself on here so here you go: He had a very luxurious day with lots of pressies and certainly seemed to enjoy his blanket even though is was a zillion degrees that day! This blanket is made by crocheting each cat face square in the round, similar to a granny square and then sewing each piece together. I went with a different colour combination than the original pattern (whic...

Whilst recently perusing an issue of Embroidery magazine in my university library (yes, really), I came across an article about Leigh Bowser , a super talented embroidery artist who makes ultra rad pop icon brooches in her Etsy shop. On investigating her work further, I found that she also runs an ongoing campaign / exhibition called  The Blood Bag Project , which raises awareness for Diamond Blackfan Anaemia . Anyone can take part in the exhibition and since I am not monetarily blessed I thought this was a really fun and unique way to contribute to a worthy cause, so I did: I liked the idea of trying to make the bag look like a real transfusion bag and then filling it with different textured textiley things which represented the blood; I used ribbons, wire, lace, foam hearts, fake flowers, fabric scraps, shaped sequins and handmade cords, I also made cords and braided them together to make the 'tube' which hangs down under the bag. These were made from yarn, some shiny, sli...